There are literally 100s of dads out there doing this and worse right now. It sounds like you’re a great dad almost every day. That much is obvious from the things you’ve said. This was a bad day for you. It’s okay to have bad days.

I’m willing to bet that if you’re the kind of person to think about this enough to write it out, then you’ll also certainly think about what worked and didn’t work today. You’ll come up with solutions. Either you’ll change yourself or you’ll change something about the family dynamic to ensure that it doesn’t get this bad again. I believe in you; you’ll come away from this better than before.

And never forget that parenting is hard. Much harder than any person realizes before they are a parent. It’s okay to fail at doing hard things some times. Just don’t stop putting in the effort. You’ve got this. We’re cheering for you.

Such a good game! It did not have to have all the extra features it does to be worth the purchase, but they loaded this game with fun!

As usual, thank you so much for this. It’s lovely.

I really appreciated what THUMPER was trying to do, and I think it was successful at it. I have felt emotionally battered by games before. I have stepped away from a gaming session feeling drained, like I had just run a marathon. But THUMPER is the only game that has ever made me feel physically battered. Assaulted. Strangely aware of my own physicality because the game in front of me is so wildly physically affecting. Playing it is a bit like purposefully standing too close to large speakers. It’s like you’re experiencing it in two ways. Like you’re experiencing it the “normal way” and also getting these shockwaves that you experience with your body.

This new game looks very fluid. Possibly also very physical.

Interestingly, there are some boardgames that do a great job of ludonarrative harmony. This is tangential, because it’s a totally different medium, obviously.

There is a lovely game called Oceans. The game is themed as an aquatic ecosystem. And what’s awesome is that the game mechanics are all about players identifying unexploited niches created by the game or other players and then exploiting those resource pools. The better they do at that, the more likely it is they generate surplus resources and that can be a niche exploited by others. Oceans does a better job of naturally simulating ecosystems than most simple models I’ve come across in textbooks.

Boardgames that have strong harmony between narrative(setting) and game mechanics just feel great to play.

It’s not easy, but it’ll be better in the long run. You’ve got this.

This reminds me of We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read by Caroline M. Yoachim. It was a Hugo nominee this year. It is a fascinating attempt at hacking/teaching the readers brain to hold two different voices simultaneously. She has said " I got it in my head that what I really wanted was to somehow train people to do something that, cognitively, we simply do not do. The closest parallel to the effect I wanted comes from musicals. There are times when multiple characters sing different lines at the same time."

You can read it here www.lightspeedmagazine.com/HowToRead

Oh wow. I’ve been in that place, but never seen that perspective. Thanks for this

I had one and I also really loved the way it sounded.

That was super interesting. Thanks!